Over 100 JNU teachers disassociate from JNUTA over group's indifference to alleged attacks on teachers

A total of 113 teachers of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) disassociated themselves from the JNU Teachers’ Association (JNUTA) over the office bearers' indifference to the dastardly attack by the protesting students on teachers. Three JNU professors were held captive, one of them for more than 24 hours, allegedly by the very students they teach, according to news agency IANS.

Students of the JNU have been protesting for the past several days demanding a complete rollback of a proposed hike in hostel fees, along with reconvening of the Inter-Hall Administration meeting that had passed the proposed fee hike on October 28. The JNU Students Union (JNUSU) also demanded the resignation of Vice-Chancellor Mamidala Jagadesh Kumar, claiming he had lost the faith of the students and teachers.

On November 20, the declaration signed by all the teachers accused the JNUTA of being hand in glove with the miscreants in attacking, abusing, confining and intimidating their own colleagues. They also dissociated themselves from all the resolutions and statements of JNUTA made since November 1, 2019. 

"The indifference of the office bearers of JNUTA to a series of such dastardly attack on teachers is shocking and deplorable. Even more deplorable is their sly justification of these incidents on flimsy grounds. Evidently, they are hand in glove with the miscreants in attacking, abusing, confining and intimidating their own colleagues. We the teachers, therefore, decide to dissociate ourselves from JNUTA from this day, the 20th of November 2019. We also dissociate ourselves from all the resolutions/ statements of JNUTA made since 1st November 2019."

The statement read, "Whereas the Jawaharlal Nehru University Teachers' Association is an association of the teachers, by the teachers, and for the teachers, JNUTA, as controlled by its current office bearers and their coterie, have in the most brazen manner refused to condemn the attack confinement and intimidation of teachers and their family members by a group of miscreants among the students, since October 28, 2019. This conspiratorial silence on the pan of JNUTA has only abetted further violent and aggressive targeting of the teachers."

Narrating the ordeal, the declaration further read, "Wardens have been attacked in the night, their houses invaded, their children lifted momentarily as a coercive tactic, they and their family members abused in order to create panic and fear in them. The woman Associate Dean was confined, abused and attacked for thirty hours. The Dean was heckled and attacked and the ambulance in which he was being taken to the hospital forced to move towards the Health Centre even as his health had deteriorated alarmingly. And all these officials are teachers of the University that JNUTA claims to represent."

"When urged by the teachers, the JNUTA office-bearers told them that they would mediate with the students to free the woman colleague from illegal and violent confinement in her classroom in the SIS-Il building. Instead. they instigated the miscreants and promised them support for their unlawful and inhuman act at the very scene of her confinement," it added.

Blaming the JNUTA of being the root cause of current deadlock Dean of School of International Studies, JNU, Aswini Mohapatra said that it is controlled by left-wing coterie and has turned JNU into a hotbed of Azadi brigade. Taking to Twitter, he said, "We, a total of 113, concerned teachers of JNU decided today to dissociate ourselves from the JNU Teachers’ Association. We believe that JNUTA is the root cause of the current deadlock. Controlled by a left-wing coterie, it has turned JNU into a hotbed of Azadi brigade."

Earlier he had also tweeted, "Govt needs to understand that current JNU students’ agitation is the product of left-wingers’ frustration with the receding primacy of so-called secular liberal mainstream narrative. Each such quasi- violent students’ stir infuses sanjivini into the dying left movement on campus. Wonder how the UPA Govt would have reacted had the ABVP karyakartas vandalised the statue of Jawaharlal Nehru on JNU campus & painted VC office with abuses. No amount of apology would have worked. Present NDA Govt is either indecisive or unwilling to act against the miscreants."